In the field of dieting, it is important for a dieter to know how many calories he is consuming. All other things being equal, the success of an attempt to lose weight depends heavily on the dieter's limiting of his calorie intake. It is therefore helpful for the dieter to know precisely how many calories he is consuming during the course of a day. Toward this end, a number of calorie counters have been described to enable a dieter to keep track of the calories he is consuming. Typically, such counters take the form of a wrist-watch, including a counter-circuit for entering a count indicative of caloric intake, and a display for displaying the number of calories which have been entered.
Examples of such calorie counters have been referred to in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,100,401, issued July 11, 1978 to Tutt et al; 4,101,071, issued July 18, 1978 to Brejnik et al; and 4,159,416, issued July 26, 1979 to Brejnik et al.
Such calorie counters may function well and effectively as long as the dieter remembers to enter every caloric intake into the calorie counter. Unfortunately, however, most people with weight problems have compulsive habits which cause them to eat food habitually and without conscious awareness that they are doing so. Such a person may be totally engrossed in another task and may eat whatever happens to be within reach without even noticing that he is doing so. Since such a person does not notice he is eating, he naturally does not enter the calories he is consuming into the calorie counter. Such behavior defeats the ability of the calorie counter to accurately tally the number of calories being consumed. Thus, the counter will consistently display a low total caloric intake and deceive the dieter into thinking that he can afford to eat more than he should.